Adultery

Sometimes journalism is useful for highlighting important trends in human behavior. Other times, however, journalistic coverage of a topic does more to inflate the popularity of an idea because its novelty is sure to attract attention.

According to Washington Post columnist Shadi Hamid, this is exactly what’s been happening surrounding the topic of polyamory. Hamid asked in a recent article:

Is it really popular? Or are people only saying it is. A self-fulfilling prophecy might be at work: Polyamory becomes more widespread because we think it’s already widespread. Norms around sexuality change because we think they’ve changed — even if they haven’t.

Hamid notes an uptick in interest of polyamory from Gen-Z users of dating apps like Tinder and Hinge, and cites depictions of polyamory on streaming sites like Peacock and Max. But just as in regular relationships, fantasy is much easier to maintain than reality. “In this light, polyamory offers both license and a patina of legitimacy to the exploitative sexual desires of some men.”

He also notes that despite adherents’ insistence on the infinite nature of shared love, time management is also a salient issue:

As lived experience, polyamory is difficult and often unsustainable for most mere mortals. Having one partner requires planning. Having multiple partners requires even more, which is why accounts of “polycules” always seem to involve a lot of work, making shared Google calendars an essential tool in the arsenal of love.

Jealousy, like love, is a natural human emotion: If you love someone, how realistic is it that you will want to “share” that person with someone else?... It is no accident, then, that those who try polyamory often come away disillusioned. Only about 30 percent say they would do it again, with many citing as obstacles possessiveness and “difficult to navigate” emotional aspects.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Though offering some helpful insight, this is obviously the worldly viewpoint on sexual relationships. When preaching on sexual faithfulness in marriage we must add the spiritual consequences of adultery, including Hebrews 13:4, “Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous.”

Earlier in 2024, many of us watched replays of the tragic collision and collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore. The accident led to the loss of several lives and caused enormous damage and disruption. As footage emerged, it was striking to see how immediately and totally the bridge seemed to come down. It looked like it happened all at once. The bridge had been constructed without any redundant support structures. The tragedy revealed that all of its supports were essential. Knock any one of these out and the whole thing will fall.

We might say something similar about Paul’s teaching in 1 Corinthians 6:9–11, one of the key biblical texts that addresses same-sex sexuality. This is not the sole focus of the text—Paul is talking about various sins—but it nevertheless provides essential foundations for how we should approach this whole issue as Christian believers.

In today’s climate, the church cannot afford to neglect Paul’s words. Paul provides vital teaching in 1 Corinthians 6 about same-sex sexuality. None of his words are wasted. Each facet of his teaching needs to be upheld alongside the others, like vital supports of a bridge. Neglecting any one will destabilize our approach.

As if online dating wasn’t hard enough, now users have to sift through profiles looking for increasingly expansive definitions of what it means to be in a committed relationship. Many people using dating apps are on them looking for “the one.” Increasingly, they’re running into profiles of people looking for a second, third, or fourth.

The monogamists say mainstream dating apps are being inundated with users who are in consensual open relationships, and they’d like them to go find their own app. Others say the apps are for people of all relationship styles and, as long as they’re up front about it, what’s the problem? The profiles clearly state: “ENM.” The letters stand for ethical nonmonogamy and more often than not, aren’t spelled out.

In late 2022, one dating app rolled out the ability for users to designate their “relationship type” at the top of their profile and whether they are monogamous or not, which the company says was a response to the needs of Gen Z.

“Gen Z is the most fluid generation in terms of their sexuality and identity, and they need their relationships—and their dating app as the meeting point—to support their openness to different types of connection,” a Hinge spokesman says.

A 2022 survey of more than 14,000 dating app users globally found that 16% of Americans have recently considered an ethical non-monogamous relationship. And around one-third of Americans describe their ideal relationship as something other than complete monogamy, according to a 2023 YouGov poll.

In August of 2022, the University of Michigan Library announced that one of its most prized possessions, a manuscript said to have been written by Galileo around 1610, was in fact a 20th-century fake. This brought renewed attention to the checkered career of the man named as the likely culprit: Tobia Nicotra, a notorious forger from Milan.

Nicotra hoodwinked the U.S. Library of Congress into buying a fake Mozart manuscript in 1928. He wrote an early biography of the conductor Arturo Toscanini that became better known for its fictions than its facts. He traveled under the name of another famous conductor who had recently died. And in 1934 he was convicted of forgery in Milan after the police were tipped off by Toscanini’s son Walter, who had bought a fake Mozart from him.

Here's his explanation of what had motivated his many forgeries, which were said to number in the hundreds: “I did it to support my seven loves.” When the police raided Nicotra’s apartment in Milan, they found a virtual forgery factory, strewn with counterfeit documents that appeared to bear the signatures of Columbus, Mozart, Leonardo da Vinci, George Washington, the Marquis de Lafayette, Martin Luther, Warren G. Harding, and other famous figures.

Investigators had also found a sort of shrine to his seven mistresses, at least according to The American Weekly. The article described a room with black velvet-covered walls, with seven panels featuring paintings, sketches, and photographs of the women with fresh flowers in front of each. “Incidentally,” the publication added, “he had a wife.”

After separating from her second husband, the actress Scarlet Johansson expressed her doubts about marriage. "I think the idea is romantic; it's a beautiful idea," she said, "[but] I don't think it's natural to be a monogamous person. It's a lot of work."

Although Johansson also stated that living together is a far cry from being married. "Anybody who tells you that it's the same is lying," she said. "It changes things. I have friends who were together for ten years and then decided to get married, and I'll ask them on their wedding day if it's different, and it always is. [Marriage is] a beautiful responsibility, but it's a responsibility."

When scientists studied the brain chemistry of the newly love struck they found that certain chemicals are elevated when love is new. Researchers at the University of Pavia, for instance, found that levels of nerve growth factor (NGF)—a protein that maintains the health of neurons—were higher in people who had reported just falling in love when compared to single people or those in long-term relationships. After about a year, though, the subjects' NGF levels fell back to a normal level.

But after the first years of wedded bliss, some discontentment seems to follow. A poll of 5,000 married couples found that men and women begin to take their marriage for granted after two and a half years. Half the couples surveyed for the 2008 study reported that they felt undervalued at the 2.5 year mark. The majority of the men said they stopped picking up after themselves, while the women were no longer making an effort to look nice for their spouse. A 2011 survey of married couples found that irritation peaks at the 3-year mark. More than two-thirds of all of those surveyed said that little quirks, which were seemingly harmless and often endearing during the first flushes of love, became major annoyances at 36 months.

Marriage therapist Lori Gottlieb claims that modern marriages are often fraught with incredibly high expectations, especially around sexual satisfaction. In other words, many married people churn with discontentment about how their spouse is not meeting their sexual needs. Today, Gottlieb says, we don't just want sex. It has to be sex that is "intimate," "transcendent" and "self-actualizing."

Even married couples who say they are satisfied with their sex lives often crave more. For example, Gottlieb mentions a study that asked participants who had had affairs why they did so. Fifty-six percent of the men and thirty-four percent of the women who admitted having affairs said they were "happy" or "very happy" in their partnerships, but cheated anyway.

Time magazine recently featured an article that asked, "Is monogamy over?" The article offered various opinions, including "monogamy is a charade" that leads to "institutionalizing dishonesty," and "[monogamy] is just an option, not the default," and "There's no right, there's no wrong." Time also featured Pastor Andy Stanley who offered this biblical view:

Monogamy is more like an endangered species. Rare. Valuable. Something to be fed and protected. Perhaps an armed guard should be assigned to every monogamous couple to ward off poachers. Perhaps not.

The value a culture places on monogamy determines the welfare of its women and children. Women and children do not fare well in societies that embrace polygamy or promiscuity. In the majority of cases, sexual freedom undermines the financial freedom of women. Sexual freedom eventually undermines the financial and emotional security of children.

If we are only biology, none of the above really matters … If we are only biology, monogamy was probably a flawed concept from the start. But very few of us live as if we are only biology … As a pastor, I've officiated my share of weddings and I've done my share of premarital counseling. I always ask couples why they are getting married. Survival of the species never makes the list.

The "I" and "You" that inhabit our bodies desire more than another body. We desire intimacy—to know and to be fully known without fear. Intimacy is fragile. Intimacy is powerful. Intimacy is fueled by exclusivity. So, no, monogamy is not obsolete. It's endangered.

An article in Vanity Fair contains some shocking quotes and vignettes about a website that connects people for the sole purpose of having sex. Marty, an investment banker from Manhattan, claims that he's been "racking up girls." He says he's slept with 30 to 40 women in the last year: "I sort of play that I could be a boyfriend kind of guy," in order to win them over, "but then they start wanting me to care more … and I just don't."

"It's like ordering Seamless," says Dan, another investment banker, referring to the online food-delivery service. "But you're ordering a person."

"There is no dating. There's no relationships," says Amanda, a senior at Boston College. "They're rare. You can have a fling that could last like seven, eight months and you could never actually call someone your 'boyfriend.' [Hooking up] is a lot easier. No one gets hurt—well, not on the surface."… It's a contest to see who cares less, and guys win a lot at caring less."

One of Amanda's friends chimes in, "Sex should stem from emotional intimacy, and it's the opposite with us right now, and I think it really is kind of destroying females' self-images."

The reporter says that none of the guys she spoke to want to be in a relationship. "I don't want one," says Nick. "I don't want to have to deal with all that—stuff." "You can't be selfish in a relationship," Brian says. "It feels good just to do what I want."

She asks them if it ever feels like they lack a deeper connection with someone. There's a small silence. After a moment, John says, "I think at some points it does." "But that's assuming that that's something that I want, which I don't," Nick says, a trifle annoyed. "Does that mean that my life is lacking something? I'm perfectly happy. I have a good time. I go to work—I'm busy. And when I'm not, I go out with my friends."

Gerontologist Dr. Karl Pillemer, whose book 30 Lessons for Loving is drawn from 700 interviews, discovered that older adults "place intimacy as a high priority" in their marriages. He cites the example of Jennie B., now an 82-year-old widow who married her first and only husband when they were in their mid-20s, and were sexually active through their 47 married years before his death in 2003. Jennie explained,

There's an intimacy that comes later that is staggeringly wonderful. You can hold hands with this person you love and adore, and somehow it's just as passionate as having sex at an earlier age. There is such a sense of connection and intimacy that grows out of a long relationship, that touch carries with it the weight of so many memories. And many are sexual.

Indeed what she misses most as a widow, she says, is holding hands. "Sex was certainly an important and joyful and healing part, but I'm not sure that the connection through holding hands, which elicited such peace, was not a deeper intimacy," she wondered.

John Freeman writes in an article titled: "Sex and the Silence of the Church”:

In today's highly-charged sexual culture, almost no one is okay in dealing with sexual lust. We don't have to go looking for ways to stain our hearts; it comes looking for us!

But I've learned that we'll go to any lengths to keep from being honest about all this …. [For instance], I was having lunch with a businessman from my church, and halfway through he brought up his Internet pornography usage. What happened next was a microcosm of what is happening throughout the church. I asked him when it started. When he was 10 years old. How often do you look at porn? Several times a week, for a couple of hours at a time. Anyone know about this? No. Are you in a men's group at church? Yes. Does this topic ever come up for discussion? No. Would you be willing to bring it up? No way!

Then he started to backpedal, saying it's not really that big a problem nor is it that damaging. I'm not usually blunt with someone, but I said, "What I hear coming from your mouth is addict-speak. You're far worse off than you can possibly imagine. Can you believe that Jesus longs to enter this area of life with you?" He looked at me like a deer caught in the headlights. I don't think we'll be having lunch again anytime soon.

One of the most devastating repercussions of pervasive online porn use by young men is its distorting effects on relationships. Men are finding that "real life" women are not as sexually satisfying to them as digital women. Some women feel pressured to act like porn stars to meet expectations. Damian Thompson, author of The Fix: How Addiction is Invading Our Lives and Taking Over Your World, writes about this 21st century malady:

Some women are finding it increasingly difficult to satisfy men, particularly those under 30. It's not their fault. Short of digitizing themselves, there's no way they could fulfill the needs of their porn-obsessed partners. Why? Because, to put it bluntly, their boyfriends [or husbands] no longer want to have sex with human beings. Their brains have been conditioned by fantasy. Sex with another person can no longer produce the same rush of dopamine and endorphins that [come from looking at online porn]. This is the logical endpoint for both sexes of an addiction to internet pornography ….